Hi Joe,
There are a few resources for people who want to learn how to use
the command prompt effectively. I'm not sure how familiar you are with
the command prompt yet, but I can tell you what I know already:
- help mode: Many linux commands will give you a list and
expanations of their options if you give '--help' as an
argument
ie. <command name> --help
ls --help
(Be forewarned, though, that many of these lists are long, so
it helps to have set a long scrollback buffer in your terminal
window (if you are using an Xterm or a telnet client)
- manual pages ('man pages'): man pages are the equivalent of
the command prompt encyclopedia. They also tend to be written
for people with a familiarity and understanding of linux (there
are, I think, around 600 commands after all. Normal mortals
like me get around with about 10-15 :) but they are a useful
resource.
ie. man <command name>
man ls
- HOWTOs: I checked the current list of HOWTOs and MINI-HOWTOs at
http://metalab.unc.edu/LDP/HOWTO/HOWTO-INDEX-3.html
but I didn't find much in the way of help on command usage.
- newsgroups: I can't point you to specific news groups right
off the top of my head, but I could suggest that you use
something like dejanews ( http://www.dejanews.com ) to carry
out a search on the commands you're looking for. This will also
help you find the relevant news groups. In any case, this is a
good first step before posting to groups - the second step is
to find a list of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ). Reading the
FAQ before posting is a really good idea - people on the news
groups get kinda tired of seeing the same question raised again
and again.
That said, if you wanted to put together a web page that would help
explain some of the common linux commands, I'm sure you would find a
fair bit of help from the folks on this list, as well as potentially a
place to host it.
Hope this helps,
Pete
------- Forwarded Message
Date: Wed, 12 May 1999 12:31:37 -0700
To: seul@seul.org
From: joe@whidbey.net
Subject: command-line focus website or mail list
Are you aware of any web site or mail list which focuses
primarily on linux command-line use?
------- End of Forwarded Message